


is this the end (of all the endings)?

by charleybradburies



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: (the baby is a wolf baby), (well....one of them), Accidental Baby Acquisition, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Announcements, Baby Animals, Brother-Sister Relationships, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Declarations Of Love, Developing Relationship, Dorks in Love, Dreams, F/M, Female Friendship, Fix-It of Sorts, House Stark, Not Canon Compliant, One Shot, POV Alternating, POV Arya Stark, POV Gendry, Pack Family, Pregnancy, Prophecy, Prophetic Dreams, Reunions, Season/Series 08, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, Tumblr Prompt, Unplanned Pregnancy, Warg Arya Stark, Warging, Wargs, Winterfell, Wolf Pack, Wolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-30
Updated: 2019-05-31
Packaged: 2020-03-29 16:09:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19023361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charleybradburies/pseuds/charleybradburies
Summary: A needy little direwolf pup brings a new dawn for Arya and her pack.[Tumblr] (chapter 1)[title from taylor swift's "king of my heart"]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shannonissatan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shannonissatan/gifts).



> Please enjoy, kudos, and comment!!

She stops listening after he says “imminent responsibility.”

Bran might be trying to help, but supper’s already been an uncomfortable affair, and his awkward, ominous attempted warnings were too much; the castle is still in disrepair, Arya's stomach is still giving her trouble, and Sansa is still far too concerned about everything. Then again, perhaps the concern was warranted - about the war and the winter, at least. Arya was sure her discomforts would pass, just as any wound would heal. 

Still, she decides to retire early that night, trying not to think on Bran's words too much or too soon. Whatever was imminent would come, would it not?

It does indeed, though she’s not certain at first that the responsibility is hers. She dives that night, deep in a wolf dream like she used to have often, the likes of which have been scarce since she’d left for Braavos. She’s in Nymeria again, somewhere vaguely familiar, legs heavy with grey fur rushing over snow and then stone, something small and warm in her mouth, anxiety recognizable in her chest. 

Then, she’s in Arya’s room, dropping a pup onto the furs of Arya’s bed, a figure Arya can only imagine is her own wrapped in them. She whines, and Arya herself meets the wolf’s eyes, for what feels an endless moment, and then, in a moment of the slightest consciousness she thinks it mustn’t be a warging dream, but a truer dream, one of her mind reaching for Nymeria, and for answers.

She wakes at first light to squeals, though, Ghost himself curled at the end of the bed with his nose touching a wolf pup. 

“You ought to be guarding Sansa,” she says first, and he whines lowly at her in response. She makes her way around the bed to find that he’s curled around a fuzzy pup, smaller than even Ghost had been, tucked a bit past the edge of her blankets. If the poor thing had stayed outside, when she’d first been Nymeria the night before, it might not have made it to the morning; she’s struck with fear for it, this little black and grey pup. 

She bends over to look at the seemingly sickly thing, but has to stand back up and go to her basin to vomit, an unfortunate routine she’s gotten too accustomed to in the past couple of weeks. It had even been keeping her from sparring, which is probably for the better, as with this little pup in her chambers she can only pretend she cannot imagine why. It is not so outlandish to think that any of the Starks could have been so bonded that their wolf might have found themselves a mate about the same time as their human had, and humans were not inevitably more careful with such matters. 

She knows not if she could even call them mates, Arya scolds herself. Jon had been cold to Daenerys recently, and she had begun to be much the same towards Gendry, even though her heart ached at it.

She bundles the pup up in a blanket and takes them to Gilly, Ghost trotting behind, concern as clear in him as it is in her. Little Sam is precious, and gentle with the pup, terribly worried when his mother clarifies that she’s indeed never raised a direwolf, but pleased when she agrees to help Arya care for the pup, and they swaddle the little creature like Gilly had Sam. Ghost returns to guarding Sansa along with Brienne, but comes to get Arya at dusk that first day, leading her out through the godswood with the pup wrapped against her chest, all the way to the heart tree. 

First, she sees only Bran, seated facing the tree with Podrick close by his side, the only ones visible as she walks the path she’d rushed down during battle, so recently and yet so long ago still, and then Nymeria pops up from behind the tree, closing the distance between them in only a few long strides and then happily accepting being petted, a gesture of trust Arya had not expected. 

They were bonded still, for true, and she could cry. 

Bran stays silent as Nymeria pulls Arya round the tree, to where three more pups lay, atop a pelt laid on the snow. Arya unwraps the pup on her chest, holding them out for Nymeria to lick, and she does, before tenderly grabbing them and laying them with the others. She lays herself down, posing to let the pups get milk from her, and then she presses her nose against Arya’s belly. It’s barely for a moment, but it’s more than enough.

“Your path is yours to make,” Bran says as she’s leaving, and she acts as though she’s not heard him.

It takes her a couple of days to breach the matter with Gilly. She doesn’t seek out the maester or even Sam, unwilling to explain herself, but she stops by with the pup a couple of times before Gilly asks if something is wrong, based on a nervous but wistful sort of look in Arya’s eye. 

She asks how Gilly first realized she was with child, and Gilly smiles before launching into a tale Arya’s all too happy to listen to, though she’s careful to collect what details she can, ones she can use for comparison - the moons on end without any significant moon blood to speak of, the vomiting at odd hours and after moving in ways she used to be able, the desires for foods she’d not had since childhood, the tenderness in her breasts and tightness in her tunic, the otherwise unexplained return of her reflex to cry when emotions rose within her. They don’t speak of the most obvious parts, like how she’d only once made sure Gendry had pulled out from her before he spilled. 

_**Let** him, more like,_ she thinks bitterly. It had felt far too good to have him for her to think of what could come afterward, least of all what should. From what she’d known of the duties and nature, she was no mother, was she? She’d always done her best to care for children if they were her charges in some manner, and she enjoyed training them in the yard, and the idea of some little black-haired wolf-tempered children warmed her heart, but….

_The path was hers to make._

She decides she needs to actually speak to Gendry about the matter, as terrifying as it feels. She’s barely seen him in the past month, stopping by the forge on occasion to watch him, but never close enough to let him notice her. She didn’t know how to ask what he really wanted from her without the risk of being told that it was what she couldn’t give, so she kept herself just far enough from him to imagine things would resolve themselves. Part of her knew they wouldn’t, but the idea that she could get so close to a realized dream to have it fall apart right there in her hands was enough for her to leave the pieces waiting for her.

Even before she’s entered the forge, she’s greeted by Nymeria’s whine, and smiles at the sight of the massive wolf curled up against a wall. Gendry interrupts Arya’s gaze with his own smile, and she feels tears brim her eyes in her relief. He’s setting down his work before she’s made her way over, happier to see her than she deserves. There are questions in his eyes, but love, still, and she revels in it, musing that she could forever. He barely manages to wipe his hands before she’s reached for them, and then she pulls him close for a kiss anyway, not caring there will be soot on her when they pull away. 

_Let it be known,_ she thinks. _Let it be plainly obvious whose I am, before there’s any wonder who put a babe in me._

“Can I have a moment, to talk?” she asks softly, her anxieties coming to her surface now. He furrows his brow, and she bites back the instinct to run and try never to look back again.

“You can have whatever you want from me, Arya,” he answers, ever so gently curling a hand around her neck. “Anything I can give, or get, or...make, that’s yours. _I’m_ yours.”

She doesn’t hold the tears back this time as she pulls his mouth back to hers, no idea what to say and even less desire to let him go, even the littlest bit. 

“As I am yours,” she whispers eventually, her voice firm for just that moment, before she moves his hand down to the part of her stomach that had begun to round. 

“And so are they.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short Gendry POV of _that_ moment, starting a bit before the end of Arya's POV.

"As I am yours," she pulls out of their kiss to affirm, her voice a firm whisper, and Gendry delights in it.

He's glad, too, for any touch, even (rather, especially) ones that should be saved for private, so his first reaction when Arya pulls his hand down her body from her neck a second later isn't one of reticence, let alone one of realization. She's not the sort of woman one can easily grab ahold of, and he'd seen her so little after inadvertently pushing her away, so whatever she would willingly give him he would happily take. 

He won't pretend he'd truly memorized her, but the outline of her figure feels different, and with the heightened uncertainty in her eyes as she presses his hand against her stomach the reality of it dawns on him.

"And so are they," she adds, fearful and cautious, and her meaning is clear. She looks mortified and yet he can't help a smile. Thankfully, it relaxes her some, and even with his hand still pressing against that gentle swell at her midsection she curls her hand into his. 

"A babe," he says, sounding disbelieving although he knows logically that they've taken quite a few chances at creation. 

" _Ours._ Our family, our pack, our...if you still..."

 _If...if he still wanted her?_ Here he was, certain that he'd been too forward, and yet she could doubt him on that.

"Arya, I could live to be two hundred and still want to be with you, to have a family with you. I _love_ you." 

Tears had been visible in her eyes before, but they fall now, and if not for her brilliant smile and sigh of relief, he'd truly be afraid of having turned her away with his earnestness. For whatever it is worth, he still cannot stop himself. If it was clarity she needed from him, he could say as much as she needed, and likely more.

"And you don't...you don't ever have to be someone you're not, I know you aren't some prim and proper lady, I don't want any but you. I don't think I even _could_ , now." 

She squeezes his hand and uses her other to wipe the tears on her cheeks. 

"Sorry, they...they've made me a bit more...emotional...I just - I was so - I suppose I shouldn't have been so worried but I was."

Nymeria sneezes, and he turns to see she's raised a small dust cloud around herself. Arya laughs, and the sound is so, so welcome.

_**Our** pack._


End file.
